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Wednesday, October 3, 2012

U is for Universal

The world of technology is awash with acronyms. I am often challenged when giving a talk and someone asks "What does that *** stand for? Sometimes I know the answer; soometimes I don't.

It seems as though a few of these acronyms start with B so, for my U post, I thought I'd share a few U acromyms with you.

UPS Uninterruptible Power Supply - or protection for your precious tech toys. All I know about these isthat they protect your gear from power surges and that your're crazy if you don't use them. The Webopedia definition starts:

Short for uninterruptible power supply, a power supply that includes a battery to maintain power in the event of a power outage. Typically, a UPS keeps acomputerrunning for several minutes after a power outage, enabling you tosavedata that is in RAM and shut down the computer gracefully.

A URL is technically a type of uniform resource identifier (URI) but in many technical documents and verbal discussions URL is often used as a synonym for URI.[1]"

USB Universal Serial Bus - is one of the many slots on my computer. It enables me to connect peripheral devices like external hard drives, scanners, cameras and phones to my computer. Many devices like my new smartphone connect via a micro USB. Wikipedia says: